Cooking Together for Family Meals is a 3-year pilot program awarded to CCE counties in the Finger Lakes Region. Research suggests that eating family meals may enhance the health and wellbeing of adolescents and that involvement in preparing food for dinner is related to more nutrient-rich eating patterns in youth. Our budding chefs featured 7-12 year olds from Ed Smith and Lemoyne elementary schools with moms, dads, aunts or grandmothers from each family working side-by side with their children, donning aprons, sharpening their chef knives and selecting fresh produce to prepare quick and healthy meals each week, sharing their culinary creations with the other families enrolled.

Participant satisfaction surveys indicated that: 1) all participants enjoyed the program with increased cooking skills for parents and kids alike; 2) parents recognized that their children were now more competent in the kitchen; 3) recipes were very well received with all families making 2 or more CTFM recipes at home as a family; 4) family communication around meal planning and thinking about adding more and different vegetables had increased; 4) families increased confidence in ability to modify recipes given both in the CTFM series as well as at home; and 5) families showed strong support for continuing the program with suggestions for extending the program length.

CCE educators from Cayuga, Onondaga and Tompkins County led by Cornell faculty have been invited to share this innovative pilot program at the annual meeting for the Society for Nutrition Education in Atlanta this summer. A collaborative session titled: Celebrating Family Food Decision-making: Collaborations for Change is currently being developed. Visit our website for more details and continuing developments in the Cooking Together program. For more information contact Kathy Dischner, Nutrition Team Leader, at 424-9485 x 239 or at kmd13@cornell.edu.